Has everyone heard about bayifier.com yet? If you haven’t, you need to pause, open a new tab and go there. Upload a classy, wholesome photo of yourself or someone you know and then proceed to give it the Michael Bay treatment by adding bombs, guns, explosions, fighter jets, fast cars and a Shia head (I’m not sure how you pronounce Shia, but in my head it’s always to the tune of the Chia pets jingle – “Sh-sh-sh-shia!!!”).
I’ve started a petition to upgrade the bayifier to work on video clips but since it’s a fansite, I’m guessing they don’t have a huge budget or team of developers at the ready. I also don’t really know what format to put the petition on, so it’s currently on 3-hole notebook paper in a dilapidated Lisa Frank trapper keeper I can’t bear to part with. Until my dreams come true and I can waste away hours bayifying videos and movies, I’m content to re-imagine the results in writing. Imagine the joy I felt when I watched “The Breakfast Club” and began to re-imagine it in the style of the inimitable Michael Bay. If you can’t imagine it, just picture an absurd level of giddiness and several friends rolling their eyes at me.
Since my friends think I’m nuts (nothing new there) I’m giving this gift to you, users of the Internet, to cherish and enjoy. Please allow me to present the Michael Bay reboot of “The Breakfast Club.”
The Jock, Andrew Clark (formerly Emilio Estevez): Taylor Lautner (Twilight Series)
The Brain, Brian Johnson (formerly Anthony Michael Hall): Josh Hutcherson (Hunger Games)
The Criminal, John Bender (formerly Judd Nelson): Steven R. McQueen (Vampire Diaries on the CW)
The Princess, Claire Standish (formerly Molly Ringwald): Bonnie Wright (Ginny Weasley from Harry Potter series)
The Basket Case, Allison Reynolds (formerly Ally Sheedy): Kristen Stewart (Twilight Series)
The Teacher, Richard Vernon (formerly Paul Gleason): Judd Nelson (original Brat pack member)
The Janitor, Carl (formerly John Kapelos): Jon Cryer (original Brat pack member)
We open at night, with an overhead shot of a destroyed high school campus. Police and military helicopters are flying over shining search lights while the national guard sets up barricades around the school. A voice-over begins:
Saturday…March 24, 2012. Shermer High School, Shermer, Illinois. 60062. Dear Mr. Vernon…we accept the fact that we had to sacrifice a whole Saturday in detention for whatever it was that we did wrong, what we did was wrong. But we think you’re crazy to make us write this essay telling you who we think we are, what do you care? What you did was wrong, did you think you wouldn’t get found out? You saw us in the simplest terms and the most convenient definitions. That’s the way we saw each other at seven o’clock this morning. We’re not brainwashed to believe what we see anymore, not after today…
Morning. Cars arrive at a fully intact high school. Our five students arrive separately and as their parent drop them off we get a bit of insight into who they are and why they might be here. One arrives on foot, with an obvious chip on his shoulder. In the library everyone takes a seat, we see assembled for the first time the Jock (Taylor Lautner), the Brain (Josh Hutcherson), the Criminal (Steven R. McQueen), the Princess (Bonnie Wright) and the Basket Case (Kristen Stewart).
The Teacher (Judd Nelson) enters, collects all mobile devices, and establishes our timeline. Detention will last 8 hours, and it’s clear Judd won’t be in this room the whole time. He hasn’t been teaching there long, so it’s possible he doesn’t fully understand the role of a detention moderator. He demands they stay in their seats and not move at all, they’re also assigned a giant essay on who they are to keep them occupied. What else could Judd do all day alone in the school with the exception of a janitor and five pesky students? Only time will tell. Before he hightails it to his office, McQueen smart mouths him with some delightful banter about raiding Russell Brand’s wardrobe amongst other things. Judd tells McQueen, “Don’t mess with the bull…you’ll get the horns.” What should be an empty threat seems eerily serious and sinister.
Josh tries to start his essay, wondering aloud who he is. This is a good opportunity to further explore the social dynamic of the group members, which we do with some witty banter. The banter escalates until Bonnie screams at McQueen “Go to HELL!” Judd looks up from his computer when he hears the commotion. Something very strange, possibly Russian, is on his screen and he looks like he’s in a hurry to finish something. McQueen is getting restless, and wants to know what Judd is doing so he can decide how much he’s going to act out. The rest of the group refuses to endorse his proposed antics. McQueen heads to the office alone and returns to report he saw some strange stuff through the blinds that requires further investigation.
McQueen returns to the library to update the gang and regroup. He is confident he can jimmy the lock, like they did in the old days, and demands that someone in the room provides him with a credit card or something to make the attempt. At this point, no one is taking the threat too seriously so they all (especially Bonnie) refuse to give up their credit or debit cards. Josh offers up a faulty fake I.D. – gotten in an attempt to vote in the upcoming election, he is, after all, president of the young Democrats of Shermer. A discussion begins about the clubs each person participates in (this provides some further exposition and valuable foreshadowing.) We learn:
Taylor: Really strong, good at wiring things and engineering. Knows where everything is in the athletic department.
Josh: Science & computer geek. Despite being a junior, he’s passed AP chem and is currently in AP physics.
McQueen: Great at woodshop and cars. Can build everything, break into stuff and source heavy machinery.
Bonnie: She knows who everyone is, where their locker is, and what kind of stuff is in it.
Kristen: Mopey and a loner, she’s hidden everywhere you can hide in the school so she knows about secret passages and stuff. Spent a whole summer reading War & Peace from the original Russian text.
Josh uses his computer skills to hack in and see Judd’s computer monitor without Judd knowing they’re looking. Oh, no! Judd is a secret Russian agent embedded in the high school and in collusion with the janitor, Jon Cryer. Judd has been tasked with finding an important Russian scientist (and his research) who has gone underground and may be hiding out in the area, possibly amongst the faculty.
Some further research is done and it turns out Judd associates with some very bad criminal types in mother Russia and if they get their hands on this technology it could mean World War III. Josh recalls some surprisingly hush-hush, high-level experiments happening in the chemistry lab, and the motley crew decides to band together to save the day. A heated discussion about how they should deal with this information gets intense enough that they don’t notice Jon Cryer discovering the intel on the library computer screen. Before they can contact any sort of law enforcement or military agency, the outer doors of the building are locked down and the Internet and phone lines are disabled. The gang is on their own to find a way to prevent the unthinkable.
Montage of sneaking through the school, collecting bits and pieces, and hiding from Judd and Jon commences. An explosion is rigged on the roof of the gym, intended to be harmless, but attract enough attention to get a major law enforcement presence immediately. Traps are set up trying to get the villains locked down before the explosion so they can’t escape in the heat of the moment. They find the research and split up the papers between them. Josh is able to decipher enough of the science to tell us what a big deal this information is and how drastic the implications are.
Lots of small scale chase action happens as all of the traps are set in place and the whole thing nearly falls apart three or four times. Finally the villains walk into their traps and the small explosion goes off. The gang is trying to override the lock-in system when we find out Jon Cryer has escaped and everyone is in danger! The gang rushes to the only exit they can use – the gym roof – but then they’re stuck up there. They have one more trick up their collective sleeves, but they’re reluctant to use it. With no help in sight, they trigger the fire they’ve planned in the chemistry lab to trick the bad guys into thinking the research has been destroyed.
The sound of fire trucks becomes apparent and soon helicopters with search lights are flying overhead. The students are brought down from the gym roof and confident they’ve saved the day. They’ve handed over the intel to trusty government officials and the villains are in custody, this time to stay. As they walk across the football field and away from the barricades going up around the empty school, they take a moment to celebrate. They all fist pump in celebration while in the background the chem lab blows up, providing that final Michael Bay explosion halo to frame our heroes.
Credits roll out with a Maroon 5 cover of the original theme song, “Don’t You Forget About Me” and through the credits we see how the five stay in touch and all go on to make the world a better place. The End.
